


a thread that doesn't belong

by calaeriel



Series: pre-"canon" (what little there is) [1]
Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game)
Genre: (she's a half-elf), Original Character(s), Original Universe, elves being fancy, npc turned main character, the world isn't mine, what good is a character backstory without angst or missing parents
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-20
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:00:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27117152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calaeriel/pseuds/calaeriel
Summary: Journal-like monologues from one of my D&D characters.
Series: pre-"canon" (what little there is) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1979339





	a thread that doesn't belong

**Author's Note:**

> I've not actually played with Rho yet, but she is an important background NPC for a character that I did play with. As such, there's a brief period of time in her young-adulthood that belongs to a canon that isn't mine. (I have permission to write in the world and make a culture for her background, though).

For as long as I can remember, I've been shadowed. I guess that's how it works when you're a curiosity, not really part of one world or the other. I was left here as a baby; isn't that how the story always goes? Wrapped in a blanket and dropped on the doorstep of a fine house: hopefully they'd care for a tiny being left alone in the world? Cliché or not, that's pretty much how it happened. It was clear right from the start that I was no elven-child, despite my ears. The elves have a sort of solemn wisdom, even as babies. I was just loud.

My oldest sister likes to tell the story sometimes after the equinox feast, late in the night when the sky is dark, the brightly shining stars rival the sparks from the bonfires, and everyone is tired from the long day. The light flickers and she muses about how much I've grown in such a short time. I don't have as much time as she did. 

"I remember when we found you, Rho," she says, leaning back in her seat. "It was late, almost 3 turns of the clock after moonrise, and we heard the most awful wailing outside the foyer. Even then, you were so very intense, all the time," she chuckles. " I rushed down the stairs to Mother's solar as she was already walking out towards the front door. We looked out the window together, but all we could see was the rain running down the pane. I grabbed my dagger as she opened the door. By that time Father and Thandar had joined us." Hebrien stops to take a sip of her wine, swirling it around in the crystal glass Tyel gave her when they were married. She always uses it for feasts.

"I'd convinced myself the noise must be from some sort of wounded animal, but then we saw you on the step, wrapped in that ratty shawl and screaming fit to wake the dead as water dripped down from the eaves. I suppose I wouldn't have been terribly happy either, in that situation. Mother picked you up, looking through the woods for any sign of who might have left you, but there was none. There weren't even any footprints in the mud."

By this time I'm inevitably scrunched back in my seat, trying to avoid the amused looks from anyone nearby as Hebrien describes how I screamed and screamed nearly nonstop for the next few days, until it seemed like I exhausted myself and accepted that this new home was there to stay. My friends know that I'm adopted, of course (they could hardly miss it), but I never tell them the details. They're used to babies who blink owlishly up at the ceiling, not tiny reddened bundles of rage. All those kinds of emotions are dampened here, I suppose? I've never quite found a way to describe it. It's a shock, though, for newcomers, for certain.


End file.
